


We Built Another World

by withthepilot



Category: Star Trek RPF
Genre: Adultery, Infidelity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-30
Updated: 2010-12-30
Packaged: 2017-10-14 05:54:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/146096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withthepilot/pseuds/withthepilot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one gets to see the way John tears him down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Built Another World

He remembers being young, the way seemingly simple things could flatten him: a pretty girl smiling at him from across the room, a free round at the bar before last call, the spit shine of new hubcaps. Now everything seems so common that it's hard to take. He's married, he acts, he pays insurance on a car he doesn't even like to drive. He doesn't have the energy to feel guilty about how much gas it guzzles.

"Come on," John says one night, tugging him away from his perch at the bar. "I'm driving you home." He's come to expect this sort of thing from John, his friendship.

What he doesn't expect is being pulled into John's lap in the driver's seat, nor his strength—and fuck, John is stronger than he looks. Karl dares to touch him under his crisp dress shirt and presses a hand to his groin, the heel of his palm lifting the cool metal of John's belt buckle to the bare skin of his stomach, making him hiss. John whispers things like _jesus_ and _need you_ and Karl takes it all like a wrecking ball in his gut. When was the last time someone actually _needed_ him?

He doesn't feel bad about it. It's an unspoken thing between married men—that sometimes they just crave things that aren't afforded to them. At least he's not fucking a waitress or a publicist. Hell, Nat's probably cheating on him anyway—and if she's not, she certainly ought to. He's thousands of miles away and not just physically.

After that first time, John invites him over sometimes and it's downright adorable, the way he says, "I've got two six-packs and there's a game on. We should order a pizza."

"What kind of game?" Karl will ask in return, and John never has an answer ready. He's shoddy at pretending, but it's the thought that counts. Usually, Karl gets there and John's at the door in seconds flat, like he didn't know what to do with himself the whole time he was waiting. There's rarely any beer and if a game is actually on TV, Karl never checks.

One day he comes by and John's working in his garage, skin grease-slicked and clingy white T-shirt stained with the marks of dirty machinery, wrench dangling from his clever fingers. It's blindsiding. Karl grabs John's shirt with both hands, pushing him down to the still-warm hood of the car, insinuates his body between John's opened legs. Because it's not fair how he can make Karl _burn_ just by fucking standing there; how the twist of his shoulders and arc of his neck can singe Karl's synapses, ripping all the wires apart and then fusing them back together into something strange and new.

Clothes come off like desperate deconstruction. Then they go back on again. Karl goes home, where he pushes his hand down his jeans as soon as he gets in the door and tries to remember that oil-soaked smell; it's permeated his clothes yet it's just not the same.

It goes on. He wants to say it's like he's young all over again because he keeps finding himself in places meant for the young: motel rooms, damp attics, backseats of cars he doesn't drive. Most of the time, he feels older than ever, erecting untruths and secrets from morning 'til night. Then John comes along with his crooked grin and takes that familiar sledgehammer to Karl's bones, damn well razing him to ruins.


End file.
